PANAMA CITY BEACH — Back Beach Road is moving from desolate to developed.

“It’s encouraging to see the volume of commercial activity coming out,” said Panama City Beach building official Ken Thorndyke. “The number of restaurants and stores just continues to grow.”

Pier Park celebrated its five-year anniversary in February and continues to be a catalyst for the development of the surrounding area.

“A lot of commercial construction is in the pipeline being talked about,” Thorndyke said. “Pier Park is a big driving factor in commercial construction.”

One of the biggest developments under way even bears the Pier Park name.

“Of course, right now the biggest project going on is our Pier Park North project,” Thorndyke said. “It’s well under way, and several large box [stores] and small boxes will be filling in around that. Pier Park North is a big commercial generator right now.”

Slated to open this spring, the development is a partnership between the St. Joe Co., property management company CASTO and Strategic Real Estate Advisors (SRA) and is located across U.S. 98 from the existing Pier Park shopping center.